MLB.com's Carrie Muskat has been covering Major League Baseball since 1981 and is the author of "Banks to Sandberg to Grace: Five Decades of Love and Frustration with the Cubs." You can follow her on Twitter @CarrieMuskat. Here, she blogs about the Cubs.

6/16 Here come the Yankees

Yankees pitching coach Larry Rothschild knows only too well what can happen at Wrigley Field if the wind is blowing out as it did Thursday. The AL East power comes to town on Friday for a three-game Interleague series.

“They’re good and we know that,” Quade said. “It’ll be a heck of a challenge for us.”

Taking three out of four against the Brewers, who had jumped into the Central Division lead, has helped the Cubs’ confidence. Doug Davis will open the Interleague series on Friday against Freddy Garcia. The Yankees lead the AL in home runs and are sixth in batting. Is the key keeping them off balance?

“That’s the plan, right?” Davis said. “I don’t think it really matters how hard you throw as long as you have something off-speed to speed them up and slow them down. I believe I have four pitches that are all different speeds within five, six miles an hour difference. As long as I can mix them up and get ahead with all of them, I can give us a chance to win against any team.”

He’s not caught up in the hype surrounding this series:

“Definitely, it’s a media thing for you guys to write about,” he said. “ESPN thinks there’s two teams, and that’s the Red Sox and the Yankees. It’s just hyped up by the media. It’s just another game for us.”

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